Todd Bridgman & Stephen Cummings 
A Very Short, Fairly Interesting and Reasonably Cheap Book about Management Theory [EPUB ebook] 

Conceived by Chris Grey, the Very Short, Fairly Interesting and Reasonably Cheap series offers an antidote to conventional textbooks. Each book takes a core area of the curriculum and turns it on its head by providing a critical and sophisticated overview of the key issues and debates in an informal, conversational and often humorous way.



In Management Theory, Todd Bridgman and Stephen Cummings uncover enduring myths about famous theorists, from Adam Smith and Max Weber to Frederick Taylor, Mary Parker Follett, Abraham Maslow and Kurt Lewin. By exploring how these myths became cast as the foundations of management, this accessible and engaging book generates new ways of thinking about what management could be today and in the future.



Students can head to You Tube to watch a selection of specially-curated, bitesize videos -
20 Insights on Management Theory – which explain key topics relating to management theory. Lecturers can visit 
https://study.sagepub.com/bridgman to access a range of Power Point slides that can be used in their teaching.

Table of Content

Chapter 1 Why another book on management theory?

Chapter 2 The Classical School: Looking again at the foundations of management theory

Chapter 3 Management theory discovers the human worker

Chapter 4 Fitting the worker to the organization: Personality, groups, teams and culture

Chapter 5 Heroic leaders and the glorification of change

Chapter 6 The rise of ethics and corporate social responsibility

Chapter 7 Conclusion: The past, present and future of management theory

About the author

Stephen Cummings (@theatomnz) is Professor of Strategy and Innovation and Co-Director of The Atom Innovation Space, at Victoria University of Wellington. He completed his Ph D at Warwick Business School. Stephen’s research investigates how assumptions about history can limit innovation and he is currently Co-Chair of the Critical Management Studies Division at The Academy of Management. His recent books include Handbook of Management and Creativity (Edward Elgar, 2014 – with Chris Bilton), Strategy Builder (Wiley, 2015 – with Duncan Angwin), A New History of Management (Cambridge University Press, 2015 – with Todd Bridgman, John Hassard and Michael Rowlinson), and the forthcoming A New History of Sustainable Management (Palgrave – with Todd Bridgman). His article, Unfreezing Change as Three Steps published in Human Relations (with Todd Bridgman and Kenneth Brown) has been downloaded over 200, 000 times.